In today's business world, communications via electronic mail resources are becoming increasingly popular. One such electronic mail resource is generally known as E-mail. Communications via E-mail may occur between two persons within a private network system, or between one person in the private network and another person outside the private network. It should be understood that while the present invention will be described with reference to receiving and transmitting E-mail, other electronic mail resources are also contemplated for use with the present invention, such as but not limited to, fax, voice and video mail.
The term "private network" generally refers to any private network generally nonaccessible to the public at large, such as used by a business, corporation, university, government agency, church, charitable organization, etc. The private network may comprise a local area network including a plurality of personal computers, a private server and a firewall router, all interconnected via a data connection. The private network may also include a branch-office router for connection to a wide area network.
The private server controls all electronic mail resources which are sent or received in the private network. E-mail communications are readily transmittable between the personal computers within the private network. E-mail communications outside the private network generally occur through the firewall router which connects the private network with the Internet or some other public network.
All E-mail destined to a person within the private network is stored in the private server at the assigned address or "mailbox" of the intended recipient. Often times, a person who is away from the private network, such as a business person who is away from the office, will want to access the private server to check for any E-mail messages. Such a person will hereinafter be referred to as a "Travelling Business Person" or "TBP".
Generally, the TBP can access the private server through a dial up Public Switch Telephone Network ("PSTN") connection, or alternatively, from the Internet or other public network through the firewall router. Problems arise when the TBP is unable to access the private server via the Internet due to various network restrictions which may be placed on such connections by the business or corporation. The PSTN connection may require a long distance call.
An option has been to designate an address in a network external to the private network generally accessible to the public, i.e., a public mailbox resident in a public server, where E-mail messages are to be sent. However, this option lacks security in that the E-mail, while sitting at the public mailbox, may be improperly accessed and viewed and/or stolen by a non-intended party. Further, this option generally provides limited connectivity to internal corporate messages.
Often, a TBP would have a private or corporate mailbox in the private server and a personal mailbox in the public server. For convenience purposes, the TBP would normally want to keep corporate messages separate from personal messages. A way of accomplishing this is to have all corporate mail sent to the corporate mailbox. By providing both a personal and a corporate mailbox address, a TBP is unaware of where important corporate messages may be stored, and would thus have to check both mailboxes for messages, which may result in wasted time and money. Further, the addition of a personal mailbox address also increases the number of E-mail addresses that the TBP's correspondents must deal with.
The present invention is directed toward overcoming one or more of the above-mentioned problems.